November 23, 2015 -
He's being called a "Blue Dog Democrat," but John Bel Edwards' successful campaign for Louisiana governor focused on populist themes like Medicaid expansion, tax fairness, increasing the minimum wage and defending public schools.

September 21, 2015 -
So far this year 67 individuals and companies have given $1 million or more to super PACs supporting presidential candidates. Southern donors, including many Texas oil billionaires, account for over 50 percent of the contributions and have given exclusively to GOP candidates.

August 28, 2015 -
When Hurricane Katrina struck the U.S. Gulf Coast 10 years ago this month, it passed over some of the nation's densest oil and gas production infrastructure. The resulting spills offer crucial lessons for residents of the Atlantic Coast as federal regulators weigh a plan to open an area from Virginia to Georgia to offshore drilling.

August 14, 2015 -
Southern governors, working in concert with energy industry lobbyists, are pressing the Obama administration to open ocean waters off the East Coast from Virginia to Georgia to oil and gas development. But a burgeoning grassroots movement bringing together environmentalists, business leaders and coastal residents is gaining momentum as it fights to block drilling in the Atlantic.

July 22, 2015 -
In 1965, South Asian students attended a July 4 rally in Louisiana to see how the holiday was celebrated. But the event was put on by white-supremacist Citizens' Councils, and some in the Confederate flag-waving crowd chased and assaulted the students. Watching Gov. Haley wrestle with the divisiveness over that flag brought back memories for Elaine Parker Adams, who also fled the crowd that day.

July 3, 2015 -
After the Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage throughout the nation last week, some Southern political leaders pledged to resist the ruling. Their statements recall Southern politicians' attempts to resist the Supreme Court's decision to end segregation in the 1950s and '60s.

April 30, 2015 -
Five years after the BP disaster, a group of governors led by North Carolina's Pat McCrory is pushing for drilling in the Atlantic. The group has close ties to a secret-money nonprofit and energy lobbyists, a relationship that raises questions about transparency, ethics and the blurring of public and private interests.